LVIV: Ukraine’s defence lines were holding against the Russian attack, President Volodymyr Zelenskiy said in his latest video on Thursday, adding there had been no respite in Moscow’s shelling of Ukraine since midnight.
“We have nothing to lose but our own freedom,” Zelenskiy said, adding Ukraine was receiving daily arms supplies from its international allies.
He said it had been two years since Ukraine recorded its first Covid-19 case: “It’s been a week now that another virus attacked,” he said of Russia’s assult.
Zelenskiy said Russia’s changing tactics and shelling of civilians in cities proved Ukraine was successful in resisting Moscow’s initial plan of claiming a quick victory through a land assault.
He told Russia to study the word “reparations” as Kyiv would demand Moscow makes up for all it has destroyed in its attack.
He also said Ukraine was paying out pensions and offering handouts to those unable to work because of the war. He said 16,000 foreigners volunteered to fight for Ukraine.
In an emotional speech, Zelenskiy said Ukrainians had lived through two world wars, the Holodomor famine, Holocaust, Soviet terror, the Chernobyl nuclear explosion as well as Russia’s annexation of Crimea and support for rebels in the east.
“We don’t have the biggest territory … we don’t have nuclear arms, we don’t provide oil and gas to international markets. But we do have our people. We do have our land. This is what we are fighting for.”
Zelenskiy, in a message for Russian President Vladimir Putin, said: “Go save your own Russian speakers. Not all over the world – but in your own home. There are many of them there, some 150 million. As for here — Glory to Ukraine!”
Meanwhile, in Moscow, Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov said on Thursday he believed some foreign leaders were preparing for war against Russia and that Moscow would press on with its military operation in Ukraine until “the end”.
Lavrov also said Russia had no thoughts of nuclear war.
Offering no evidence to back up his remarks in an interview with state television, a week after Russian invaded Ukraine, he also accused Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskiy of presiding over “a society where Nazism is flourishing”.
He said he had no doubt that a solution to the crisis in Ukraine would be found, and a new round of talks were about to start between Ukrainian and Russian officials.
But he said Russia’s dialogue with the West must be based on mutual respect, accused Nato of seeking to maintain supremacy and said that while Russia had a lot of goodwill, it could not let anyone undermine its interests.
Moscow would not let Ukraine keep infrastructure that threatened Russia, he said.
Moscow could also not tolerate what he said was a military threat from Ukraine, he said, adding that he was convinced that Russia was right over Ukraine.
“The thought of nuclear is constantly spinning in the heads of Western politicians but not in the heads of Russians,” he said. “I assure you that we will not allow any kind of provocation to unbalance us.”
Russia did not feel politically isolated, and the question of how Ukraine lives should be defined by its people, he said.
Ukrainian officials have accused Russian forces of hitting civilian areas but Lavrov said Russian troops had strict orders to use high-precision weapons to destroy military infrastructure.
Offering no evidence, Lavrov said Russia had information that the United States was worried about the prospect of losing control over what he described as chemical and biological laboratories in Ukraine and accused Britain of building military bases there. — Reuters/AFP
